Traditional Outlook Research Articles

Sexuality, Authenticity, and Modernity

In his Journals for 26 December 1921, André Gide wrote:The borrowed truths are the ones to which one clings most tenaciously, and all the more so since they remain foreign to our intimate self. It takes much more precaution to deliver one's own message, much more boldness and prudence, than to sign up with and add one's voice to an already existing party .... I believed that it is above all to oneself that it is important to remain faithful.This celebration of fidelity to oneself gives voice to a central theme of modern consciousness: the search for authenticity. The idea that there is an ‘intimate self’ whose needs cannot be fulfilled by following ‘borrowed truths’ is a familiar modern notion and one that contrasts sharply with traditional outlooks. In many pre-modern societies value was believed to be less responsive to the individual: gods, natures, or history were the sort of things that inscribed value on states of affairs, and thus on our lives. Living well was not, therefore, a matter of being true to ourselves, but being true to our creators, natures, or traditions. Moral truths were precisely those things that were borrowed; that was what made them true

Culture, conflict, and cost. Perspectives on brain death in Japan.

Japanese surgeons have performed only one heart transplant in the quarter century since the procedure was developed. Possessing the requisite training and technology, transplant surgeons have been stymied by several factors that elude professional and political solution. Most critically, the lack of a brain death standard limits the availability of transplantable organs. Mistrust of the medical profession, traditional outlooks on death, and the primary placed on consensual decision making have fueled debate about brain death and transplantation. Volatile and value laden, these issues have overwhelmed the discussion of health care resources, equal access to high-technology medical procedures, and insurance coverage for transplantation.

World Society in the Chicago Laboratory

In the disciplinary history of the study of international relations, the methodological experiments of Charles Merriam, Quincy Wright, Harold Lasswell and others in the University of Chicago since the early 1920s argued for a scientific approach as distinct from the traditional wisdom outlook. Textual interpretation of the Chicago School's writings is intended to show how these early conceptions may be mediated in the methodological fabric of the present research orientations. In analysing the historical meaning of these early texts, the organizing concepts and epistemic codes are related to their contemporary contexts and discursive practices. The Chicago School absorbed methodological principles from current debates concerning evolutionary theories, Social-Darwinism and Pragmatism. Their principal research object was urban community and the evolutive relationship between personality, society and environment. This scheme was supposed to apply from local communities to world-wide structures. In this sense, the Chicago School argues for a unified base for policy studies. In the history of international relations as a discipline, the Chicago School represents early attempts to define international relations in terms of reductive methodologies, participatory research, democratic institutions and pluralistic conceptions of politics. The textual interpretation shows that the Chicago School is mediating to the present two fundamental methodological issues: (a) as a research outline it takes for granted some social and political setting, a context of interpretation and prescription; (b) the scholar must imagine a position and justification for his own activities between this context and the organized body of knowledge he is supposed to represent in contemporary discourses.

The Rights of Students in Courses Using Animals

Should students have the right to exercise their ethical beliefs concerning animals by refusing to participate in class demonstrations or experiments that use animals? Should teachers be required to add an optional procedure for those students? In the past decade, two major trends in our society suggest that the answer to both questions is, or will ultimately be, yes. From amoral perspective the view that nonhuman animals are fellow creatures entitled to moral concern as such is replacing the traditional outlook that sees them as mere resources for us to use however we choose. This changing outlook reflects the intellectual adjustment that is taking place in the realm of ideas, in keeping with the Darwinian perception that animals are our evolutionary kin. Moral consideration is increasingly being extended to all living things, and students are asserting their right not to harm animals in the classroom. From a legal perspective, recent state and court actions have upheld the protection of students' right not to be forced to violate their ethical, spiritual, or religious beliefs in pursuit of their education, At the secondary level, the dissection of living animals was banned in Florida high schools, and students may be excused from dissecting a dead animal with a note from parents. In California, students in grades kindergarten through high school have won the right to refuse to dissect, kill, or otherwise harm animals and to substitute an alternative activity. The 1993 Edition of the California Education Code on Pupils' Rights to Refrain from the Harmful or Destructive Use ofAninwJs states that If the pupil chooses to refrain from participation in an education project involving the harmful or destructive use of animals, and if the teacher believes that an adequate alternative education project is possible, then the teacher may work with the pupil to develop and agree upon an alternate education project for the purpose of providing the pupil an alternate avenue for obtaining the knowledge, information, or experience required by the course ofstudy in question. The Code stipulates that the alternate education project may not be covertly used to punish the pupil by being more arduous than the original, animal-based, one. In addition, the pupil may choose an alternative testing procedure for course credit if the standard test requires the harmful or destructive use of animals. In Maine, in 1989, the State Counselor ofEducation issued a Policy Advisory suggesting that students be informed that they may choose not to dissect but do an alternative project instead. Legislation pending in New Jersey, affecting high school students, provided a model

A glimpse into traditional outlook towards health: A literature review

Traditional healing processes are delivering health needs to a large number of people in many developing countries. This paper reviews traditional healers' knowledge about concepts of health, etiology, anatomical and physiological knowledge, diagnosis and treatment and management of abnormality.

Coming of Age among Blind People in Israel

ABSTRACT Based on ethnographic observations amongst adults blinded in childhood, this paper extends the study of stigma and handicap into the domestic setting. The respondents described their sighted parents' patronising practices towards them. Parents were reported to have attempted to channel their blind offspring into less-than-optional occupations and marriages. Social conditions were frequently such that blind youths were in a situation of status inconsistency—their educational achievements were superior to their occupational achievements. Current social conditions have also improved marital chances for blind women of Middle-Eastern background. All this leads to a chasm between the traditional outlook of sighted parents and the reality in which their blind offspring live. The latter relate ambivalently towards their parents, and sometimes distance themselves from them and their communities of origin.

The Lieder of Fanny Mendelssohn Hensel

FANNY MENDELSSOHN HENSEL (1805-1847) is-known today chiefly as the elder sister of Felix Mendelssohn and the grandchild of the theologian-philosopher, Moses Mendelssohn. However, she was a first-rate musician in her own right, particularly as a pianist and as a composer of Lieder and piano pieces. Many contemporaries considered her the musical equal of her brother.' Yet in spite of her considerable musical talents and prolific compositional output, neither her music nor her life has received in-depth investigation. This essay will focus on the Lieder, her largest single compositional genre, but first her activities as a composer, especially in relation to Felix, will be discussed. Although Fanny and Felix received similar musical training and were both considered gifted pupils, only Felix was encouraged to achieve professional status. To a large extent this was due to the Mendelssohn family's traditional outlook concerning suitable activi-

Imperialism: Pioneer of Capitalism.

Ever since the First World War, socialists have considered imperialism a calamity: responsible for militarism, economic stagnation, and assaults on democracy in the metropolitan countries, an impediment to economic and cultural development in the Third World. So widespread has this view become that it is shared, in its essentials, not only by Marxists but also by an entire school of liberal development economists. Bill Warren breaks with this traditional outlook, arguing that the theory of imperialism, one of Marxism's most influential concepts, is not only contradicted by the facts, but has diluted and distorted Marxism itself. In particular, Warren disputes the claim that monopoly represents the ultimate stage of senile capitalism and sets out to refute the notion that imperialism is a regressive force impeding or distorting economic development in the Third World. The book argues on the contrary that direct colonialism powerfully impelled social change in Asia and Africa, laying the foundation for a vibrant indigenous capitalism. Finally, it takes issue with the conventional view that postwar economic performance in the Third World has been disastrous, presenting a powerful empirical case that the gap between rich and poor countries is actually narrowing. Closely argued, clearly written, original and iconoclastic, Imperialism: Pioneer of Capitalism is a compelling challenge to one of the chief tenets of contemporary socialist politics.

Traditional Outlooks for a New Century

Traditional Outlooks for a New Century

Variability in β Cephei and B Stars

Rather than review β Cepheids, this paper will address the issue that β Cephei variability is only a readily detectable tip of a much larger iceberg of variability among β stars. This variability being widespread, it becomes crucial to differentiate β Cepheids from other variable subgroups by observational criteria if one is ever to make physical inferences concerning the instability mechanism involved. Shobbrook (1978) has raised this point indirectly in discussing the importance of defining the width of the instability strip: if the strip is narrow, the pulsational instability is more likely to arise in the stellar core; if it is wide, it is probably excited in the envelope. Enormous efforts have gone into delineating the evolutionary and HR-D confines of ß Cepheids. In this paper it will be suggested that the situation is more complicated than the traditional outlook holds.

India's feeding programmes and their relevance

In the course of any discussion on problems of food production and hunger in the Third World it is not unusual to come across a heavy emphasis on the cultural backwardness and traditional outlook of the common people. A study of the Indian situation, however, shows that the more important issues lie within the sphere of planning and policy making. It is not traditionalism but the intensive area development model and the resultant inequality which is primarily responsible for the nutrition problems of the majority of the population. The paper here examines in some detail one aspect of the nutrition policy; the nutrition distribution programmes in the context of the total developmental strategy. India's nutrition programmes were meant to ameliorate hunger and malnutrition among the vulnerable section. But the existing socio-economic and political structure of the society has so affected the formulation and implementation of these programmes that they have practically become irrelevant. The inadequacy of resources, the inefficiency of the delivery services and the maldistribution of the available resources, weighted in favour of the richer section, combine to make ineffective all welfare programmes for the poor. Further, the herding of the heterogeneous programmes under an all-India nutrition policy deprives the national policy of a uniform conceptual basis and, therefore, undermines its rationality. In their present form the nutrition programmes lack an epidemiological perspective. They are not effectively integrated with the health services of the country. Their coverage of the vulnerable groups has no scientific basis and is most inadequate. An examination of these issues shows that any serious attempt at planning feeding programmes must take note of the available infrastructure which at present is not only inadequate but also ineffective insofar as the objective of reaching the poor is concerned. Secondly, if an integrated programme has to be offered, then nutrition programmes must find their place in the list of the health priorities and only when their impact and feasibility are. demonstrated effectively within the available infrastructure should they become a part of the package. Thirdly, it is worth keeping in mind that even if feasible nutrition programmes are evolved they can only function as temporary relief measures for a small number of people. A lasting improvement in the nutritional status of the vast majority is a function of their productive capacity and hence of their socio-economic development which must simultaneously occur and form the backbone of any nutritional policy.

Chemosystematics and Its Effect Upon the Traditionalist

What is a traditionalist, taxonomically speaking? I suppose a traditionalist might best be defined as a taxonomist trained as a pheneticist, practicing his trade as a pheneticist, and constructing his classification using primarily phenetic data. By this definition I am a traditionalist and consequently can claim to answer, for myself, the effect of chemosystematics upon my own traditional attitudes and outlooks. And this has been profound. I say profound not because this new field has solved any large number of critical problems in plant taxonomy, but because where it has been used with skill and judgement, it has proved much more effective than phenetics in solving the particular problems concerned. Indeed, without chemical data many of the more intractable problems having to do with familial relationships among flowering plants generally are likely to remain unresolved: there are simply too many cooks and nearly all with varying tastes. Even if they all see the same phenetic substances in the phyletic cabinet, they nonetheless are prone to come up with different combinations of this or that ingredient (selected characters), with varying amounts (intuitive weighting), to say nothing of the condition (basic I.Q.) or temperature (zealousness) of the oven (i.e., brain). I suspect that most traditionalists, even some of the best, do not like to be reminded that their approach is fraught with such variables, or that data derived from some other discipline might prove superior to those from their own. As an example, when the late Dr. Alston and I first showed the utility of paper chromatography for resolving problems of natural hybridization in Baptisia, an eminent, not so classical, plant systematist suggested that our documentation of complex hybridization in this genus could have been accomplished with equal clarity using selected morphological characters arranged upon Andersontype scatter diagrams. Needless to say this intellectual guffaw was issued by the late Edgar Anderson, and the ironic part of all this is that Anderson himself was the first to collect and call attention to the existence of hybrid swarms among this group of plants (Anderson, in Larisey, 1940b), but he failed to perceive its complexity, in spite of the fact that he collected his hybrid populations of Baptisia in a region where the potential for trihybridization is not infrequent (AlstoD & Turner, 1963). In fact, I seriously doubt that Anderson, or any traditional sys tematist, including myself, would have been able to recognize, much less intuit, trihybridization within this group, to say nothing of its documentation with reasonable certainty using morphological characters. Trihybridization, of course, is rather the exception in nature: most species tend to comingle two at a time at any one site. But even then, lacking in situ clues (for example, two parental taxa occurring together with their putative

The Religious Import of Confucian Philosophy: Its Traditional Outlook and Contemporary Significance

The Religious Import of Confucian Philosophy: Its Traditional Outlook and Contemporary Significance

Australia, Trusteeship and New Guinea

T HE AUSTRALIAN GOVERNMENT is faced with a dilemma in New Guinea. Trusteeship, under the United Nations, has become outdated and equated by some with colonialism. However, political instability in the region to the north, together with the recent Indonesian take-over of the western half of the island, inhibits the Australian Government in disengaging from an adjacent territory whose present capacity for complete self-rule is doubtful. Yet, to move more slowly than the emerging political forces in New Guinea will not only antagonise the anti-colonial bloc, and even Australia's friends, but is likely to jeopardise the future relationship between Australia and the nation whose eventual existence has now been somewhat reluctantly recognised. Australia has been involved in New Guinea since the latter part of the nineteenth century, but its present jurisdiction in the territory derives, for the southeast portion (Papua), from the British transfer of authority in i906 and for the northeast portion, first, from the Mandate granted by the League of Nations in i919, and subsequently from the trust agreement negotiated with the General Assembly of the United Nations in I946. Apart from an initial desire to deny the territory to an unfriendly power-an intention which reappeared at the time of the granting of the Mandate-New Guinea aroused little attention within Australia before I942.1 However, in that year indifference was shattered by the Japanese invasion. Vague and undefined fears, associated traditionally with an Asian threat, now crystallised and New Guinea was depicted as a springboard for enemy violation of the Australian mainland. Following the Second World War this image of the possible role of New Guinea significantly influenced governmental and public attitudes to the territory. For the Labor Government, which had held office since I94I, this resulted in an attempt to square security considerations with a traditional outlook on colonialism; for the Liberal-Country Party Government, which has been continuously in office since i949, it has meant, at least in its early years, a far less ambivalent approach. The Australian Government's position on trusteeship at the San Francisco Conference on International Organization can best be described as equivocal. Posing as the defender of the rights of small nations, espousing proposals for

Foreign Policy: The Conservative School

These two books are as dissimilar as two books can be which deal with essentially the same problem and are inspired by essentially the same philosophy. The problem is the survival of the West, and the philosophy is one of progressive conservatism. In foreign policy, both authors share a preference for the traditional outlook and methods and an aversion to the crusading tendencies of mass democracy.

Practical Training in Industry for the Graduate in Mechanical Engineering: Part I

Part I of this paper reviews the changing outlook during the past forty years on methods of training the mechanical engineers of the future. Industry and universities have reviewed and amended traditional methods and outlook in significant ways and, in particular, in ‘bridging the gap’ between those responsible for training in industry and those responsible for policy and curricula in the universities. The effects of two world wars and the incidence of military service are indicated. Financial considerations concerning fees and maintenance during both university training and apprenticeship are related to opportunity. The influence of the present conditions of more jobs than there are suitable applicants is considered in relation to long-term planning of the training of the mechanical engineer of the future. The general lines of procedure usually required for those who include a full-time university course as a part of their education and training are considered, and particular attention is given to the increasingly accepted view that pre-university practical training has many advantages which are now recognized by professors and others who teach in the universities and senior technical colleges. The need for work and play which educate and relax the young man during his post-school five-year formal engineering training period is explained and examples are given; and reference is made to the fact that those least interested in ‘outside’ activities usually benefit most if encouraged and helped to participate in such activities. It is pointed out that the common good of the individual, the university, the firm, and the nation is most likely to be achieved if a long-term view is always given preference, and that, while time is all important and must not be wasted, time must be given to the preparation for a future career—preparation ample enough to fulfil the demands that opportunities and responsibilities in later life will make.

The Royal Society and Latin America as Reflected in the Philosophical Transactions 1665-1730

THE Royal Society for the Improving of Natural Knowledge was chartered in London in I662. Its membership was made up of gentlemen who were interested in the new philosophy of Bacon and Descartes. Many of the members were Professors, Masters and Fellows of the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge; others were physicians and clergymen, and some, like Robert Boyle and Samuel Pepys, were private individuals or courtiers who had no scholastic or professional connections. The Fellows were elected, not, as nowadays, for their attainments in science, but for their interest in the sciences and scientific method. These early members of the Royal Society were anxious to add to the general store of knowledge about everything connected with their natural environment. The breadth of their interests now makes them appear credulous and even superstitious, but actually they were radically objective for their day. They boldly discarded the traditional outlook and methods of scholasticism and began anew with a determination to wrest the truth from nature for themselves. For this reason they overlooked nothing that might add to the sum total of their knowledge. The early Society followed the pattern set forth by Sir Francis Bacon in his description of Solomon's House in the New Atlantis. The members and correspondents were intelligencers, who contributed observations and facts. At first these facts were circulated among interested people by Henry Oldenburgh, but as his correspondence grew too large, he decided to choose from among the contributions and publish selected items in journal form.' The full title of this worthy publication shows the ambitious scope of the Royal Society: Philosophical Transactions giving some Accompt of the Present Undertakings, Studies, and Labours, of the Ingenious in Considerable Parts of the World. This journal was usually published in London. Among the many considerable parts of the world represented in the Philosophical Transactions was Latin America. All of Latin America, with the exception of Brazil, belonged to Spain. The Carib-

Contacts and Cultures

THE proposal to found in London a mosque and Islamic cultural centre (see p. 712) will be a cause of gratification not only to those whose more immediate needs will be served by such an institution, but also to all who will welcome the enlarged opportunities it will afford of contacts between East and West, and of the fuller understanding which, if it does not remove, will at least lower the barriers between peoples of different cultures, beliefs, and traditional outlook. The project has taken form largely owing to the personal interest and effort of His Excellency Hassan Nashaat Pasha, the Egyptian Ambassador in London, and from the beginning it has received the patronage of King Farouk. The extent of the support it will receive in the Moslem world may be gauged from the composition of the influential committee preparing the scheme. It includes representatives of the Moslems of Arabia, of Iraq and of India in addition to those of Egypt.

The English Church and the Papacy, from the Conquest to the Reign of John

Foreword Preface Introduction 1. Ecclesia Anglicana 2. The Western Church in the eleventh century 3. The law of the Western Church Part I. The Law of the Church in England: 4. The method of this enquiry 5. Lanfranc's collection 6. The twelfth-century collections 7. Medieval libraries and contemporary writers Part II. The Relations of England with the Papacy: 8. Lanfranc 9. William the Conqueror: the traditional outlook 10. St Anselm: the rise of a papal party 11. Henry I: the maintenance of royal control 12. Stephen: the 'freedom of the Church' 13. Henry II and Thomas Becket 14. Epilogue: from the death of Becket to Magna Carta Appendix Index.

To Unify the Liberal-Arts Curriculum

C URRICULUM reform has been under way for so long in the liberal-arts colleges that it is possible now to examine the results with some degree of hopefulness, though it is not yet possible to appraise their value. One fact must strike the careful observer at once: there seems to be no agreement among the students of liberal-arts education as to the fundamental principle or principles upon which a college curriculum ought to be built. Numerous experiments are being tried, but the whole body of experimentation bears an uncomfortable similarity to rule-of-thumb methods long ago abandoned by careful scientists. The difficulty seems to be that there has been no recognized integrating concept upon which to base experiments. The liberal-arts college once possessed such a concept in the older idea of culture. The older college was a distinctly classical institution. Destined for the most part for the professions, its students expected to enjoy a certain degree of leisure and a favored cultural status. Culture meant philosophy, the classics, and the humanities in general, the spirit of detachment from affairs of the present and of contemplation of the values of the past. The older college thus found its guiding principle in the elements of the culture of detachment, as conveyed through the learning of the past. It was possible in a college of this type to present a unified curriculum. Unification indeed took care of itself. Content, purpose, and method were in more or less complete harmony; this is no longer true. During the last half or two-thirds of a century the curriculum has absorbed so many new departments and courses, with conflicting aims and points of view, that the old unity has wholly disappeared. The content of the new far exceeds in quantity that of the old. Yet the college has attempted, until within the last decade, to maintain its traditional outlook, and the older members of its faculty still lament the fundamental change in spirit which not even they can deny. If liberal-arts education is to be reintegrated, more will be required of the college than merely a change in curriculum, but curricular changes aimed directly at the need for reintegration should accomplish much and are a sine qua non to that end.